News

Protesters at last week's campaign in Eversley
advertisement

Fury over approval for thousands of new homes

By Lewis Rudd
October 13, 2011

Residents have called on council bosses to “hang their heads in shame” after approving blueprints for thousands of new homes across Wokingham considered by many to be “fundamentally flawed”.

The executive at Wokingham Borough Council last week rubber-stamped masterplans setting out the scale, roads and community facilities of mini-towns on four sites known as Strategic Development Locations (SDLs).

Efforts by the Liberal Democrats to call-in the decision for further scrutiny failed this week, as councillors were told the matter was too urgent to revisit.

Protestors bring Eversley traffic to a standstill

The council has earmarked the development of 1,500 homes in north Wokingham, 2,500 homes in south Wokingham, 3,500 homes at Arborfield Garrison and 2,500 homes on land south of the M4 in Shinfield.

However, an extraordinary meeting of the council’s cabinet on Wednesday, October 5, did not run smoothly, with residents and members clashing on a number of issues relating to the project.

Local people affected by the documents are angry with the council for what is perceived to be a lack of information relating to traffic modelling for each of the four developments.

They also criticised the way the authority has consulted with people about the proposals, with Martin Rutter, chairman of campaign group Arborfield Garrison Residents Action Group (AG-RAG) telling the meeting how residents feel “alienated”.

The latest results relating to traffic modelling were posted on the council’s website on Monday, October 4.

However, those present at the meeting felt this was insufficient time to scrutinise them ahead of the masterplan being adopted.

Mr Rutter said: “The feedback AG-RAG has received from residents suggests the re-consultation was totally flawed and most residents feel totally alienated from the process.

“During the reconsultation total disdain has been shown to residents. Will Wokingham Borough Council executive, officers and members agree they have completely mismanaged the whole process and hang your heads in shame?”

Councillor Angus Ross, executive member for strategic highways and planning, was presented with 76 questions from residents at the meeting – most of which related to traffic modelling and highways issues.

He told the meeting how the results of the traffic modelling show journey times around the borough will be lowered to what he described as an “acceptable level of variation” through proposed highway alterations.

But he added that developers still had a lot of work to demonstrate they can meet such levels, saying the council will refuse planning applications which cannot meet the specifications of the traffic modelling.

“These documents before us tonight in no way preclude all the matters we are going to face,” he said. “What they do is show the infrastructure requirements. It also clearly demonstrates more work by developers needs to be done to achieve nil-detriment on all roads.”

Cllr Ross also vowed to make sure the council kept in regular contact with their colleagues at Hampshire County Council, who earlier in the week said they would consider taking legal action if Wokingham Borough Council went on and approved the documents.

Cllr Ross said the neighbouring authority had been fully consulted about the plans and was confident it would not push for a judicial review.

He said: “I met with highways officers and counterparts at Hampshire County Council today in a planned series of meeting with them. They were consulted throughout the process. Opposition is not a reason to legally challenge the decisions of this council.”

Cllr David Lee, leader of the council, was forced to step into the row when resident Jim Murphy accused the authority of rushing its decision.

Mr Murphy said: “You are pushing through with plans which are fundamentally flawed.

“I am seeing a case of deja vu because you are pushing through plans and making a decision on the hoof.

“You say you are going to spend the next five days ratifying any alterations made tonight. How is that protecting residents?”

Cllr Lee hit back by saying: “[We have been] working tirelessly for the benefit of the residents and accept some residents do not want any houses.

“But 800 houses have been built each and every year for the last 30 years without infrastructure and we have to stop the desecration of this borough and the concreting over of back gardens.”

Road rage at debate

During the special executive meeting more than 70 questions were posed to councillors.

Here is a taste of the debate that took place in the Shute End offices.

Arborfield resident Stephen Bacon asked: “Given that (one) a public commitment was made on June 2 that no building of any sort would take place until the Garrison was vacated; (two) that the Army plans to leave in 2015; and (three) that the Garrison Strategic Planning Document (SPD) assumes a build-out rate of 15 years, how can the plan be achieved without finding an alternative site that we refer to as Plan B?”

Councillor Angus Ross replied: “No commitment to this effect has been made.

“There are two points. Firstly, as long as we get assurance on the infrastructure delivery and parts of the Garrison are made available there is no need [for the Ministry of Defence] to totally withdraw before development started.

“The Core Strategy has outlined a delivery plan appropriate for development and there is no reason why we cannot be flexible.”

Ashley Wright asked: “Are you confident the council will not be challenged by other outside bodies such as Reading and Hampshire of Hart County Council as they have clearly registered serious concerns and opposition to the current plans.”

Councillor Ross replied: “No legal challenge has been reported and we have taken the steps to try and avoid such as process.

“Hampshire County Council has been consulted throughout and offered the opportunity to comment during the examination in public, but we have taken the decision to try and balance all the issues.”

Karen Brown asked: “As the West of Wokingham School at the old Ryeish Green site looks almost certain to get the go-ahead in the next few weeks, why does Wokingham Borough Council continue to want to spend up to £40 million of council taxpayers’ money providing a secondary in Arborfield which Arborfield residents have consistently said they do not want or need?”

Councillor Ross replied the Arborfield school was a requirement of the garrison development.

| Submit Comments | View Comments (4)

« Previous Story | Next Story »

Most recent user comments 4 of 4

Show 15 | 25 | 50 per page

Reply to Karen Brown - maybe you will find that most parents do not want to send their children to these new free schools and prefer to send them to proper schools that are run by the local authority. These new schools are just a short term electoral gimmick that will fail as soon as the Government decides it no longer wants to fund them. We saw it all before with the Thatcher/Major Grant Maintained Schools and the Local Management of Schools scheme that failed spectacularly and saw those greedy schools that had bought the Govt's shilling, running back cap in hand to the local authority once the Govt funding tap had been turned off!

LarryS
13/10/2011 at 14:46

PoneRana, Wokingham: Your statement that most Wokingham residents don't want more houses in their area is pointless. Almost all residents anywhere don't want development anywhere near them, hence the term "NIMBYs". What you and the local councillors must realise is that there is a proven need for more housing in Wokingham. Unless these new houses are developed on a strategic basis i.e. with a comprehensive masterplan showing all required infrastructure such as new roads, schools, open space, local centres etc it will be developed on a piecemeal basis without infrastructure being provided. You must face the fact that the housing will be delivered one way or another either if granted planning permission by Wokingham Council or at Appeal (where the developers would win based on the housing need argument). Therefore your argument against the masterplans recently adopted is effectively an argument for no masterplanned development. Instead you must favour more development as we have seen in recent years in areas such a Shinfield which has experienced a huge number of new houses with very little infrastructure or community benefit.

stix of reading
13/10/2011 at 12:40

The Arborfield development being partially a brown field development is the only one that should go head. Most of the other developments destroy the few green field sites that are left surrounding Wokingham. It is about time that the local councillors realized that most Wokingham residents don't want more houses in the area. As our elected representatives they should be doing their best to reflect these views. There is little evidence that they are doing this.

PoneRana, Wokingham
13/10/2011 at 11:14

"more work by developers needs to be done to achieve nil-detriment on all roads.” - is this planned/contractually required, or just something that has been mentioned in passing? Surely when creating thousands of houses, the only way to achieve 'nil detriment' is to create more roads?